Lighter Than Air
by RayWritesThings
Summary: The Doctor and Donna are forced to go ballooning. Pre-Relationship


**Hello, readers. I've decided to start cross-posting some of my fics from AO3 and tumblr over to FFN, so if you recognize this story most likely you've read it on either of my accounts there (Ray_Writes and raywritesthings, respectively). If you haven't read it before, I hope you enjoy!**

**-RayWritesThings**

**Lighter Than Air**

"If we ever get down from here, Martian, I'm gonna kill you!"

The Doctor craned his neck to look down at Donna shaking in his arms, perplexed. She had her face buried in his shoulder, so it was a little hard to read her expression, but he was fairly certain that sort of statement went along with a slap or a smack on the arm, not her practically plastering herself to him. He was never one to turn down holding Donna, though, so the Doctor patted her on the back and tried to think of something reasonably calming to say.

"Well, better start planning your method, then. We'll get down."

She laughed, though it sounded a touch hysterical to his ears. At least she pulled back a little to actually look at him. "Oh yeah, got that impression from the whole sentenced-to-execution bit. What, are they hoping we'll freeze to death up here? Run out of oxygen?"

"Something like that," he replied, staring out across the horizon as they rose above yet another hillside. "Are you cold?"

"A little," she admitted quietly.

The Doctor extricated himself from Donna's hold for a moment to shrug out of his suit jacket – he'd left his coat in the TARDIS, a mistake in hindsight as it would've been warmer – and put it over Donna's shoulders. He rubbed her arms a few times, waiting for her to meet his eyes. "Better?"

The slightest smile curved her lips. "Yeah. But what is this about? Death by hot air balloon?"

"Well, the Terresains believe the sky to be the Place of No Return. What goes up never comes down. Rather than kill you on the ground they just send you up, up, and away," he explained. Donna's eyes drifted to the view outside their basket, and one of her hands reached for his, squeezing tight. He sought to regain her focus. "Still, you've got to admit it's original."

That got her attention. "Yeah, at least they're creative!" She still worried a bit at her bottom lip after. The Doctor tried not to watch, and failed badly. "We are getting down, though. Right?"

His eyes snapped back up to meet hers. "Course. TARDIS's aren't the only thing I know how to fly." Truly, Donna should consider them fortunate to have not been sent up in an aeroplane. This played much more to his strengths. "Mind you, they haven't actually built in a parachute vent, but I'm sure I can rig us something."

He reached up to grab one of the ropes, then placed his foot on the edge of the basket.

"Doctor!" Donna cried, grabbing his arm in a vice grip and nearly yanking him backwards into her. "What are you doing?"

"I've got to get up there to open a vent of some kind, Donna, or we'll really be in trouble," he told her.

"Yeah, but a bit _risky_, isn't it? Can't you just – I don't know."

"Should take a few minutes, is all." Her hold loosened slightly, but she was still watching him with a wide-eyed, fearful expression. It took him a moment not to get lost in those green eyes, but he finally managed a gentle, "I'll be fine. Just sit down, try to relax."

She let him go and sunk to the floor of the basket, and the Doctor finished pulling himself up to have a proper look at the envelop.

"Oh yes, this should be easy. Won't be long, Donna," he called down.

"Listen, just don't be up there too long. But be careful," she added quickly.

"Donna…" He paused. How to phrase this delicately? "You're not _nervous_ about being up here? Is it the height that's bothering you?"

"I wonder why that might be," Donna posed in a way that made it quite clear she was not wondering about it at all. She often did that. "I've lost track of the amount of times I've nearly fallen to my death since I met you. Or seen other people do it."

"Oh, falling to your death's not so bad."

"And you would know, would you? That must be why you're still walking around," Donna said.

Right. Still hadn't gotten around to explaining regeneration. Well, that was a conversation for another day.

"Falling to death – it's a bit of a misnomer, though, isn't it?" He pointed out instead. "Ought to be land to death, really."

"Thanks, Spaceman. Lovely mental image."

"Donna," he sighed, though it was undercut slightly by the whir of the sonic. "You think I would let that happen to you?"

A grudging "No," was her answer.

"Remember when we sat on the roof?" He continued. "All of London beneath our feet. You weren't scared then." A little sad, maybe; annoyed with him, definitely. But she'd had a smile when he placed the biodampener on her finger – actually, he didn't remember getting that back ever, come to think of it.

"No," Donna agreed again.

"And at Adipose Industries—"

"I was bloody scared then, you'd have had to have been blind not to notice that!"

"But you were brilliant! Even though you were scared. It's alright to be scared sometimes."

"Are you scared sometimes?"

"All the time. Annnnd there we go!" He tucked the sonic away, eyeing his handiwork for a moment longer. It would hold up for one journey at least. The Doctor dropped back down into the basket. "So, why don't we start you on your ballooning lessons?"

She was still sitting with her back to the wall of the basket, and she looked up at him doubtfully. "I haven't even finished my TARDIS piloting lessons."

"Who says you can't do both? Come on, you're a multitasker, aren't you, Super Temp?" He reached out with both hands, and she placed hers in his allowing him to pull her up to her feet. "Besides, you do not want to miss the view."

The Doctor gestured outwards with one arm, and this time when Donna looked over the hills spotted with trees in full bloom and the river that ran through the valley currently below them she didn't seem as anxious as before. She still kept hold of one of his hands.

"Suppose not."

They watched it all together for another few minutes, then he redirected her attention inside the basket. "Okay, so the basics. Burner heats the air in the balloon, it goes up. Parachute vent lets in cool air, it goes down."

"How do we go left and right?"

"Air currents! It's a bit tricky, but I'm sure we'll manage. Now we just have to figure out which direction the TARDIS is in."

"Something tells me this is gonna be harder than you're making it sound," she remarked, eyeing him suspiciously. He grinned innocently at her, then used the vent to bring them down a few feet. A breeze caught them and they began drifting in the opposite direction than he'd meant to. Oops.

"It'll be an adventure."

"Cause we haven't had enough of those!" Donna shook her head with a laugh. Gradually, her smile melted into something softer, the kind that always made him play chicken with his respiratory bypass as he worked out whether he was still breathing or not. "Thanks. For helping me not be scared, I mean."

He returned her smile with no thought. "You do the same for me every day." Then he inclined his head towards their makeshift controls. "Come on, then. Let's give it a go."

Donna moved over, sharing his space as he helped her get a feel for burner and vent. One hand on her shoulder, the other guiding her steering arm, the Doctor kept his smile the entire flight. Watching Donna Noble in her element, there was no feeling like it in the universe.

And if they ended up taking rather a scenic route back to the TARDIS…well, he certainly wasn't complaining.


End file.
